Glock Factory Service: The Best Kept Secret in Sights?

It’s no secret that Glock’s factory sights might not exactly be the best in the business. Pistol shooters may find a variety of faults with the sights, from the polymer material from which they are constructed to the otherwise unconventional “ball in the bucket” markings versus more traditional 3-dot sights to the dimensions of the stock sights. Whatever it is, enough people dislike them to make the field of aftermarket sights a relatively large one.

One of the main concerns heard most frequently seems to be about the durability of the polymer sights. Some damage to the side of a Glock rear sight is visible in our Armed Citizen graphic. A stock front post on one of the GunLink Glocks was starting to wear on one corner and mushroom on the other corner from being drawn and reholstered. One of our shooting buddies told us about a Glock that took an unlucky hit to the rear sight after dropping a few inches onto an end table and the sight snapped out. Other stories of sight failure can be easily found if you scrounge around online.

To be certain, the polymer OEM Glock sights are not complete garbage and, truthfully, might be just fine for the majority of casual shooters. Although they don’t make a habit of regularly releasing their numbers, Glock production hit the 5-million mark eight years ago in 2007. If the last eight years kept pace with the previous 8-year period, the numbers are now somewhere around 8 million. The majority of those pistols’ owners probably don’t spend a lot of time using them hard enough to cause any notable damage.

Nonetheless, replacing Glock sights is a common enough operation to be a big business. Whether you just want a sturdier sight or you have trouble getting the factory sights on target, there is no shortage of options for replacements. This can range from the $30 set of steel front and rear sights to tritium night sights like a $96 pair of Meprolights, a $108 XS Big Dot set, or the $150 Trijicon set. Add to that the cost of shipping and then either the cost of having them installed by the gunsmith or the cost of a $140 to $160 sight pusher tool and it isn’t hard to end up with an upgrade that costs you 60% of what the pistol itself cost.

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Enter Glock’s factory warranty service. Under “chargeable items,” right below their refinishing services, they list the sight options available, which includes Glock Steel Sights for only $20+tax and Glock Night Sights for a mere $57+tax. (2018 Update: Night sight installation price has gone up to $67, steel sights are still listed at $20) And they’re installed at the Glock factory by genuine Glock technicians. Of course, shipping a pistol to the Smyrna plant can be a pricey thing, but the good news is that they don’t need the whole pistol – just the slide, which can be shipped pretty cheap. Just fill out the warranty form, send them your slide, and you’ll have it back in a few days with fresh new factory-installed sights.

Better still, if you are in the Smyrna area of the Atlanta’s suburbs, you can swing by and have them put on while you wait and save yourself the shipping. Just don’t expect a grand tour of anything other than the guard house and the waiting room. This option is exactly what Team GunLink opted for on a recent visit to the Atlanta area.

The entire process was easy, pain free, and took less than an hour for multiple pistols from pulling into the gate to getting back on the road. Just pull in to the lot, check in with the guard shack to let them check, clear, and lock your pistol. Once checked in, your secured pistol will be returned to you, along with a visitor badge, and you will be directed to the service department. There, you will be greeted by the technician who will work on your pistol. Tell him what you want done and settle in to a seat to watch some funny Glock commercials starring The Gunny. After a bit, the tech will bring your pistol back out to you. Take the pistol back to the guard shack to have the locks removed and turn in your visitor badges, you’re all set with brand new factory-installed sights for a fraction of the price that you could have spent ordering aftermarket sights and having them installed.

We had some of each of their sights installed on pistols during our visit and we are very pleased with the new sights, as well as the service. The tritium night sights are MH3 marked Meprolight sights with the usual markings you would see if they had been originally installed and are nice and bright and easy to pick up in low light.

If you are considering upgrading your Glock sights from the factory polymer versions that came on it, this is definitely something to keep in mind. One thing to note, however, is that this service is a one-for-one swap of the sights and you won’t be able to keep the sights that were previously on your pistol. Thus, if you want to, for some reason, switch back to the original polymer sights, you’ll have to shell out the seven bucks to buy another set.

14 Responses to Glock Factory Service: The Best Kept Secret in Sights?

Dude, I can’t imagine how on earth this isn’t more popular!…And THANK YOU for this article, I was searching around for night sights, and came across this andddd sent my slide in today after confirming with Glock a few details.

While speaking with Austin @Glock I found out the following….

1. Only green, no red or yellow combinations.
2. 15 year warranty on the sights covers the dimming…get this, all you have to do is send the slide back and they replace them!….

I asked why everyone doesn’t just do this, and the response was “I couldn’t tell ya”…understandably.

You have a number of options. Were the failed sights the stock polymer ones? This is one of the big reasons that we recommend replacing those factory sights!

If you just the same sight replaced, Glock has great warranty service. From that page: “To make a claim under this warranty, contact GLOCK, Inc. at: 6000 Highlands Parkway, Smyrna, GA 30082, online, or (770) 432-1202 for instructions.” They will probably rather have you send the firearm (or slide) in to have it serviced.

If you want factory-upgraded sights – such as steel “ball in a bucket” sights, or factory night sights – use the method described in the article above to get (at least) your slide to the factory in Georgia to have Glock techs install upgrades.

Thanks for posting this article. This is very good deal Glock offers. Using the information in your article, I just receive my 19 back from Glock where I ask them to replace the OEM plastic sights for OEM steel sites. With tax it came up to around $21 total. Russell at Glock also called me before doing any work and verified exactly what I wanted. He was a very helpful person.

Just sent my Glock back for dribbling ejection of casings. Still fired without an incident… but should be pushing 3 to 5 ft away from weapon… while doing that, had the sights replaced with Glock Night Sights for a mere $57! Also, added another set of steel sights for $21 dollars in case I don’t like them. Great response from Glock, called and will call again after firing 17 with 115 and 124 grain to investigate problem. NO CHARGE for repair. Wildly impressed… Will let you all know when I get my Glock back and how it fires during IDPA session.

Just recently sent my Glock in for this service and can confirm the price for night sights has gone up $10. They haven’t updated the form on their website. If it wasn’t for this post I never would have known about this little secret. Appreciate it! Two days after they received my slide they called, and only a couple days more before it’s shipped back to you.

Thanks for the report, John! Glad to have helped. We’ll get the warranty card link above updated. It looks like they have got it updated now as it shows the Night Sights at $67 and steel sights still at $20. I wonder if that means that their tritium costs from Mepro went up.

When they called you, was it just to let you know that they received the firearm, or to get that extra $10 out of you.

I sent in my slide today. The current form still states $67 for night sights. It cost me $14.67 to ship with $350 insurance through FedEx. I only sent the slide, no barrel or guide rod/spring. I think that this will be a good deal. I had factory night sights but they were so dim that you could barely see them anymore. Can’t wait to get it back.

It’s definitely a great deal for anyone in the market for standard 3-dot tritium sights. For those pinching pennies, it could probably be shipped cheaper but for around 80 bucks shipped both ways, professionally installed by the factory, and guaranteed, it would be hard to beat that.

How old were your original sights that they had got so dim? Half life of H3 is 12.5 years, so they should be about 50% original brightness after that long. I think Glock puts a decade or so warranty on them.